I made a lot of headway on this project, so here is a recap from the top:
A few years ago, I learned that I might be eligible for Austrian citizenship by descent, as a descendant of a “persecuted national.” I finally decided to work on it this summer after listening to an episode of The Traveling Therapist, which made me realize that if I ever wanted to take an extended trip to Europe, it would be very helpful to have EU citizenship. Also, I just think it would be cool. So…I filled out an online form with all the information I had about my grandfather, and a few days later, I got a set of instructions in an email from the Austrian Consulate General. Here’s what I needed to gather, to trace my direct relationship to my grandfather and prove his persecuted status (and my good intentions):
-My birth certificate with an apostille (letter of authentication) from the State Department of New York. My mother went to get a new copy of my birth certificate from the registrar of the town where I was born. It had a mistake (oddly had the wrong place of birth for my father, which would have been a problem as I also needed to submit his birth certificate), so my mother filed a correction. Then my mother went back and picked up my birth certificate a week later. I took it (a few weeks later…kind of let this ride while I was waiting for the apostille on the criminal background check – see below) to get certified by the county clerk (meaning, certified that the town registrar who stamped my birth certificate is legit). Finally, I brought it to the New York City office to get an apostille.
-A criminal background check from the FBI, with an apostille from the State Department of the U.S. Getting my fingerprinting done took two tries because the first time I went, “she didn’t come in today” but the second time I had my background check results back in five minutes. I printed them, mailed them to the State Department with a postage-paid, certified return envelope, and got them back with the apostille a mere 3 weeks later, which was a pleasant surprise.
-My parents’ marriage certificate (ideally). It turns out their civil certificate seems to be missing, but they have a letter from the venue where they got married which lists everyone’s full names (my parents and grandparents) and that should stand in.
-My father’s birth certificate, which we had.
-My grandparents’ marriage certificate (ideally) and wonder of wonders, miracle of miracles, I found it in my aunt’s boxes of papers and mementos from my grandparents! I went over one day to look through what she had and after about 15 minutes I found it in a file of my grandmother‘s papers (with other very cool stuff like university transcripts, work resumes, a nursing certificate…) This was so exciting as no one had ever seen it before and it is even in English (from the British Consulate of Tangiers – 1954!) so I don’t need to pay to have it translated.
-A passport photo, which might become kind of a problem because I got the wrong size after trying to explain to the CVS guy what I needed, so I trimmed it myself and…it is not perfect. I hope they won’t mind. If they do, I’ll mail in new ones.
-Proof that my grandfather left Vienna due to persecution. I have a letter from the Austrian government to my grandfather regarding restitution (also from my aunt’s files) and my grandfather’s refugee case file (this is very cool) from World Jewish Relief. (I requested any relevant documents from them and from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum; I heard back a few days later from WJR but haven’t heard yet from USHMM, but I think I’m good to go with this).
-Proof of address. Since my name isn’t on any household bills, I’ll submit a copy of my vehicle registration.
-My passport.
-A signed declaration (which was sent to me, I just need to print and sign).
And…I think I’m done. I have an appointment at the Austrian Consulate in a few weeks to bring over everything in person. And maybe in the interim I’ll redo my passport pictures.
Whew!
This process began July 19th! Stay tuned, if you’d like!
(Photo credit: Michal Pech/Pexels)
